Worth the Risk(36)

“So?”

“How do you plan to maintain this level of interest?”

“I’m working on that. I’ve sent out press releases, have a social media marketing plan in place when the next round of voting begins, and—”

“I was pleased to see the numbers on my report. I was more than happy to know you were applying yourself. Rissa has reassured me that she’s given you a few challenges to deal with and she’s confident that you won’t let her down. Let’s see that you don’t, because her word is what will either earn or lose you the position at Haute.”

“I won’t.”

“So then why are you letting me down?”

“What?” I hate the sudden jolt of my heart in my chest at his words.

“I placed a call to an old friend down there, and the first thing she talks about is how you are in today’s newspaper, kissing one Grayson Malone. That doesn’t happen to be the same Grayson Malone who is on Modern Family’s website as a contestant, is it?”

Words fail me as I fumble with the keys on my computer to bring up the Sunnyville Gazette. I scroll through the home page of the local newspaper, and right there in the Tuesday gossip column is a picture of Grayson and me. Or more specifically a picture of the kiss I planted on his lips in the middle of the bar. Both of my hands are on the sides of his cheeks, and my lips are more than slanted over his.

“I can explain that picture. It isn’t what you think.”

“Hmm.” I hate that sound. “It is you in that picture, right?”

“Yes.” My voice is barely a whisper. The high from getting his praise moments ago comes crashing down with the sudden disappointment heavy in his voice. Feeling like a reprimanded child, I try to explain. “He helped me with a situation, and there was a party, and I was thanking him—”

“Whether you are sleeping with him or playing Yahtzee with him . . . how exactly do you think it looks to have the person running the contest for my magazine also mentioned in a newspaper gossip column as dating him? Because, from my vantage point, it would seem a little fishy if, say, said contestant ended up winning the ten-thousand-dollar purse.”

“But I have nothing to do with the voting whatsoever.”

“Do you think the public will believe that? Do you think they care? All they see is bias.”

“Dad . . . it isn’t as if this is some formal election . . . it’s a fun contest.”

“For you maybe, but for some of these guys, the prize money is a handsome amount. It isn’t their next reservation on a private jet, it’s how they are going to pay off their credit card bills or put a down payment on a house.”

I sigh. There’s nothing else I can do to get him to see my side of things. And sadly, while he has a point about voter perception, it’s all quite ridiculous to be so serious about the whole thing.

“Dad. I assure you—”

“I assure you that this isn’t something the editor-in-chief of Haute would be caught dead doing.”

And there it is. The final slap on the cheek to let me know what’s at stake, as if I don’t already know.

“You know what a small town Sunnyville is, Dad. You know how rumors fly. I’ve worked my ass off to do what you asked. To make this newsworthy and gossip worthy and trend worthy. All of them. And I’m still pushing for it, so if you want to be mad at me for gossip in the rumor mill, then so be it.”

“I know what I see, and I know what it looks like.”

“Is it too blue-collar in here for your white-collar hands to touch?”

Grayson’s words come back to me, and I hate that I’m hearing them in my dad’s words when I’ve never heard him imply anything of the sort. I hate that I’m wondering if he’s more worked up because of the picture and the implication of bias to readers or because I’m kissing Grayson Malone of the Sunnyville Malones.

“And your perception is wrong,” I say, knowing that he sees what he wants to see, and once he does, there is no changing his mind. He calls it the privilege of being older. I call it close-minded crap.

“I should have known you’d somehow make this story, this situation, this contest, about you. It’s what you do best, isn’t it?” The remark is sharp and cuts to my marrow. Does he really see me the same way that Grayson does? Selfish and self-centered?

I clear my throat again as I stare at all of my hard work on the layout on my screen that I’m not even here to do but that I’m trying to learn anyway, and school my voice into neutrality. “It’s late. I’m still at the office and need to close up.”

“You’re still there?”

“Yeah.” It’s where I am every night.

“Fix this, Sidney. You were doing great right up until now.”

The line goes dead, and I lean my head back against the chair and close my eyes as I process everything he just said to me. The accusations. The implications. The bullshit.

When I open my eyes, the picture from the weekly gossip column is right before me on my laptop screen. I sigh and scroll down a bit so I can read whatever nonsense they decided to publish with the picture.



In other news, it seems being a hero in Sunnyville comes with perks these days. Our very own hot dad in the Modern Family contest, Grayson Malone, seems to be spending a lot of time with here-then, gone-then, back-in-town-again Sidney Thorton. At a local party to celebrate Malone’s heroics from last week, they were seen getting reacquainted with each other. New couple alert. (picture right).